Field of the Art
The disclosure as detailed herein is in the technical field of medicine. More specifically, the present disclosure relates to the technical field of x-ray imaging. Even more specifically, the present disclosure relates to the technical field of medical software.
Discussion of the State of the Art
Modern medical facilities such as hospitals or emergency care facilities are often large and complex organizations. A medical facility may be organized into various departments or branches that specialize in a particular type of patient care or expertise. For example, a medical facility may have a radiology department that handles various medical imaging tasks such as computed tomography (CT) systems, X-ray systems (including both conventional and digital or digitized imaging systems), magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) systems, positron emission tomography (PET) systems, ultrasound systems, nuclear medicine systems, and the like. Such systems provide invaluable tools for identifying, diagnosing and treating physical conditions and greatly reduce the need for surgical diagnostic intervention. In many instances, these modalities complement one another and offer the physician a range of techniques for imaging particular types of tissue, organs, physiological systems, and so forth. However, patients requiring an X-ray, for example, must often be transported to the radiology department or even a separate and geographically distant imaging center. This can present additional delays, costs, and inconveniences to the patient and the practitioners.
Digital imaging systems are becoming increasingly widespread for producing digital data that can be reconstructed into useful radiographic images. In one application of a digital imaging system, radiation from a source is directed toward a subject, typically a patient in a medical diagnostic application, and a portion of the radiation passes through the subject and impacts a detector. The surface of the detector converts the radiation to light photons, which are sensed. The detector is divided into an array of discrete picture elements or pixels, and encodes output signals based upon the quantity or intensity of the radiation impacting each pixel region. Because the radiation intensity is altered as the radiation passes through the subject, the images reconstructed based upon the output signals may provide a projection of tissues and other features similar to those available through conventional photographic film techniques.
In use, the signals generated at the pixel locations of the detector are digitized. The digital values are transmitted to processing circuitry where they are filtered, scaled, and further processed to produce the image data set. The data set may then be used to reconstruct the resulting image, and display the image.
Despite advances in the art, there remain significant shortcomings in existing systems used for portable diagnostic imaging. Current mobile radiography/fluoroscopic imaging systems are cumbersome and expensive. These mobile systems normally incorporate a fixed, mechanical C-arm, or other mechanical configuration which connects the radiation source and the detector to one another, in order to mechanically fix the detector relative to the X-ray source to prevent misalignment outside of normally government-regulated, pre-determined tolerances. In addition, the spatial location of the detector is not always known relative to the X-ray source, as is the case in fixed, permanent digital radiography/fluoroscopic (DR) imaging systems. Especially when the subject to be imaged is very fragile or largely immobile, the need continues to exist for mobile systems which comply with applicable regulations.